#They're like my first OT3 I think!

[lunar-years]

Okay. Let's talk Jamie and Roy getting beers and being idiots.

I know we are all still processing that whirlwind of a finale. I'm understanding that a lot of people hate the Roy & Jamie scene because it is 1) backslide-y (true) 2) they treat Keeley like a prize to be won (true) and 3) it's OOC (I actually disagree with this one, but I can understand why it's complicated). I want to start off by saying I completely see where this opinion is coming from and I respect everyone who just hates the scene because it shows normally kind characters being very unkind to each other etc. This is less me arguing against that as it is me trying to articulate (at great length, sorry) why it not only worked for me, but I genuinely liked it.

I like to think I strike a balance between loving everything the show has done and hating overwhelmingly on a show I claim to enjoy, but sure, you could definitely argue that I'm just giving my favorite characters the benefit of the doubt, or making excuses for them, because they're my favorite characters. I'll admit I'm historically very forgiving of all the main characters' many fuck-ups on Ted Lasso, but that's because I think the show works best when it emphasizes how kindness, forgiveness, friendship and love can still operate between imperfect, flawed people. I like seeing them make realistic mistakes much more than I like everyone handling everything perfectly, I'll bite.

So, back to Jamie and Roy. I enjoyed their finale plot because despite them making a world of mistakes, the regression felt very, very human. I don't agree at all with the take that this somehow erased all the progress they've made this season or the friendship the show has lovingly crafted between them. In fact, I think this actively reiterated it! (Note: I am operating with my ot3 goggles on at all times, so I'm going to write this with that at least partially in mind, but I think the gist of it works even if you ignore the bits that get a little shippy.)

For both Jamie and Roy, Keeley and their love for her is a major beacon guiding them. I think that is the crisp, clear thing in both of their heads this episode: Keeley is the love of my life. And they both believe that wholeheartedly, and they both want to be with her. (and it's goofy to pretend this came out of nowhere for Jamie/since when is Jamie still in love with her/etc. because he literally told her and us this last season and nothing that has happened since has indicated otherwise, btw.) But there's also something else now, which is their relationship with each other, battling with their Keeley thoughts. It's like, in Roy's head, for instance, I imagine there are two wolves: on the one hand he loves Keeley, and wants to be with her, and plans to win back her heart. On the other hand, there's his love and care for Jamie Tartt, which is much less defined and inarticulate and maybe still a little repressed, but just as overpowering. His love for Keeley feels so simple and clear in comparison, while his love for Jamie is something complicated and unsure, and in this episode, he's leaning hard into the first to avoid unpacking the second.

So Roy starts off strong. He sees Jamie with Keeley in the hallway and he doesn't flip out!! Instead, he approaches Jamie calmly, and invites him out for beers. Think about how different this is from his reaction to Jamie's love confession to Keeley in season 2. This is Roy's growth in action, and it's a resounding sign of just how important Jamie is to Roy now. Even when he is feeling jealous of the woman he loves potentially leaving him behind for a man he loves (a completely natural reaction, let's be so real, if not a "good" one), he also knows that for as much as he wants to be with Keeley, he doesn't want to lose his friendship with Jamie.

As for Jamie, I know some people took his reaction and subsequent response to Nate's question as like, shock at the realization that he and Roy are actually friends now, which I agree is something that had to have come earlier in the timeline (what was Mom City if not that) and would seem very out of place at this point. What I saw it as instead was Jamie's brain more just. sort of short-circuiting? Because: holy shit isn't this the best day ever? First Keeley agreed to go to Brazil with me and now Roy is asking me on a date for beers? this is so sound. This invite is out of place behavior from Roy even within the parameters of their friendship, because they still have a match to win and Roy has banned Jamie from beers as part of his training and despite them being close now I find it hard to believe that Roy often comes up to him right there in dressing room to ask him to grab a beer with no pretense.

Therefore, they're already walking into that bar in completely different head-spaces. Jamie isn't planning to discuss Keeley, and for Roy that is his major intention behind the evening. Jamie is nervous and downing his beer, and Roy is internally panicking, I'm imagining, over when and how to bring Keeley up. I think Roy is thinking: Well, I don't intend to stop pursuing Keeley, I genuinely don't want Jamie's feelings to be hurt when I get back together with her (and yes, it is a huge presumption for him to assume Keeley's going to eventually take him back. But I think it's also an understandable one), so I've got to tell Jamie I care about him, and that I'm going to keep going after Keeley, and he needs to be okay with that so that this won't get in the way of our friendship, which I also desperately need and am unwilling to give up. In his mind, Jamie is of course going to accept all of this, because Roy and Keeley are soulmates, which Jamie will clearly recognize deep down because it is so obvious and right and anyway, Jamie always does what Roy tells him to do (again, this is all misguided thinking. But we can see how Roy's anxious little brain that's bad at processing feelings and holding space for emotions could get himself here, can't we?).

So again, we start off strong with Roy saying he's proud of Jamie and them both thanking one another. But then Roy's blurting out nonsense about how Jamie just needs to pull himself out of the running and just let Roy be with Keeley. Which is obviously not on. And Jamie responds, simply, with No. I'd argue this is also a huge step for Jamie. Jamie really doesn't tell Roy no anymore, he doesn't tell anyone no. Jamie has spent so much of his time since coming back to Richmond working to be the person everyone around him wants and expects him to be. This is him fighting for something he wants for once, doing what is best for him. It was a fabulous progression to see. In the moment, boy does it work Roy up, because why is Jamie not agreeing with me, Jamie always agrees with me? but obviously at this point, Jamie is in the right. His relationship with Keeley was no less meaningful than Roy's just because Roy says it was, Roy doesn't have any claim on her, and there's no real reason Jamie should not try and shoot his shot with Keeley if Roy is going to do the same.

Here's where things start to spiral. Established flaws we know about Roy: he's competitive. He's bad at voicing his feelings productively. And he is territorial about the people he loves, a category that safely includes both Jamie and Keeley at this point in time, for better and sometimes worse. Yes, his next actions are grossly possessive over Keeley, yes Roy has made a lot of effort over the past year to do and be better than that, to break free of that cycle. But look, it's not a linear process. He's going to still mess up, and he does here. In fact he's downright mean, weaponizing Keeley against Jamie and throwing having sex with Keeley a month ago into Jamie's face, bragging about it, boasting. Same old cycle, same old patterns of ego-driven, prideful mistakes.

Which promptly prompts Jamie to also fuck up by bringing up the leak. It's a concentrated response intended to get a suitable rise out of Roy, because Roy has really, genuinely hurt him here, and Jamie knows bringing up that video is the one thing that will hurt Roy just as much in turn. It's not the right thing to do, obviously, but again, it's such a human thing to do. Hurt the person who's hurt you right back, even if you're hurting someone else (Keeley) by extension. Mind you, Jamie came here expecting a hangout (/date) with Roy over a rare beer, and instead he got Roy being a complete asshole and lecturing nonsense at him out of seemingly nowhere. He reacts to this change-up, well, not greatly. There is something so messy and emotionally complicated happening here and it hinges on how very much Jamie and Roy care about each other, not negates it.

Keeley, queen that she is, rejects them both out of hand and kicks them out not the curb immediately because they're both being complete idiots, acting like they're so gracious in giving her the honor and privilege of choosing between them. Not to mention they've clearly got something going on between them they haven't worked through and that sure as shit isn't her problem, is it? Keeley (presumably, and I wish we had seen this) calls them out their shit and tosses them right back out the door.

Which leaves Jamie and Roy to lament how they've let their egos get away from them, they've been idiots (which they acknowledge immediately) and decide that now they should go for kebabs, presumably to actually hangout this time, not to interrupt themselves with inflated talk about who "deserves" Keeley more. They both screwed up, they acknowledge it, and all they can do is try again tomorrow, and in the meantime, go on that kebab date.

I guess....I can just see where both of them are coming from? it's not mature behavior, obviously, it's maybe not what we would have liked to have seen from them in the finale episode of the show. But it was regression that I didn't feel impeded their overall progress. Roy in particular was being a complete dick about it, but that's why the very next morning he's finally knocking on the Diamond Dogs' door. And honestly, that conversation was heartbreaking. When Roy admitted he'd expected, after a year of putting in the work, to be a whole new person...god. This is a man who still completely hates himself, to the point where he can't quite grasp that he can be better where he's at now, that he doesn't have to transform magically into someone new in order to do right by himself and others. And so he has to consciously determine, once again, to do better, be better.

The message is: change isn't linear, you're going to fuck-up, and fall back into old patterns. What matters is trying every day to do better together, and be better for one another, than you were the day before. That is the meeting point all three sides of the royjamiekeeley triangle were heading towards by the end of the episode.

So yes, it was rushed, because no one gets much screen time in a finale (and the overarching issue with this season anyway is god awful pacing. The last three episodes could've easily been the second half of the season, while the first half of the season was stretched out and largely extraneous). And yes, I would've liked a more thoughtful follow-up conversation between Roy and Keeley or all three of them. My biggest issue was that we didn't get to hear Keeley's voice hardly at all. I would at the very least have liked to have seen her setting them straight at her kitchen table, because turning both of them down signifies very important growth in her, too, and I would've liked exploring that more explicitly. So it wasn't perfect. But I still liked it, I really did.

[watchyourbuck]

U are even reading and sharing tuck fanfics. I mean are u crossing over? I don't understand how you can root for them this much when buddie isn't even a done deal. Ur betraying them

okay, lets maybe stop for a second alright. i ship buddie like pretty much everyone else in this fandom, that hasnt changed. its not gonna change, not even if Buck gets a whole, three season arc with Tommy.

having said that, why wouldn't i be allowed to enjoy other ships? partake, write, reblog, etc? "You are betraying them" they're not real dfghj this is a fandom for fictional characters. they dont exist, im not betraying anybody.

fandoms exist for our enjoyment, for our exploit. part of that is sometimes seeing the meaning and fun into other ships that arent your main, that arent your endgame.

i like buddie, i ship buddie, its in my bio lmao, but i still like bucktommy. i dont necessarily want them to be end up together forever but this is CANON bi Buck's first relationship with a man, and i support his journey of self discovery. as ive said before, i actually think its good he wasnt paired up immediately with Eddie. whatever happened to slow burns!!! to multishipping!!! to ot3s!!!

lets people vibe yeah? create and consume the content they want??

[welcometothejianghu]

Welcome to another round of W2 Tells You What You Should See, where W2 (me) tries to sell you (you) on something you should be watching. Today's choice: 成化十四年/The Sleuth of the Ming Dynasty

(The) Sleuth of (the) Ming Dynasty (it's hard to get an agreement on how many definite articles should go where) is a beautiful, high-budget 2020 drama about a weenie genius detective, his long-suffering and deeply traumatized sugar daddy, and the eunuch with the most difficult job in the Great Ming: keeping these two dumbasses from getting their fool selves imperially executed.

Depending on how you like it, it's either an OT3 or an OTP with an intense, underage third wheel, and either way, it's delightful. I wouldn't call it a comedy, but it has very many funny elements that keep the drama fun and engaging. The first half is full of shorter mysteries that are clever and thoughtfully plotted, and the second half goes in on the longer mystery that ties them all together.

I've already done my quick guide to the early-episode characters, if you want a taste of just how many people are running around and how wonderful they all are. But in case you want to know a little bit more before you commit yourself to a 48-episode series, here's five reasons I think you should watch it!

1. The whole thing smacks of gender

Yeah, this was originally going to be selling point #2, but I know what the people want.

This is not a show about gender. But boy it is a show that has a lot to say about gender, and not just by way of critiquing premodern Chinese gender roles (though it does do that!). Many of the cis characters are either a) somewhat gender nonconforming, b) canny enough to weaponize binary gender expectations, or c) both. Sui Zhou's entire third-act storyline is about how expectations of masculinity exacerbate PTSD in veterans. Three different AFAB characters either dress or live as men. The part where one of the male characters goes undercover in drag is played for laughs, but the joke isn't 'ha ha, a boy in a dress,' it's 'ha ha, this particular boy in a particular dress, and also he's terrible at it.'

And that's even before we get to the eunuchs.

There are several professionally dickless, permanently unmanned characters running around. One-third of the OT3 canonically had his external genitalia nonconsensually removed when he was five years old, and because of this, he has been given unimaginable authority. He's basically the second most powerful man in the entire empire, and he only gets that way by being unquestionably, ostentatiously, and genuinely submissive to the first most powerful man.

I have seen other Chinese media where eunuchs are treated like sinister clowns, good only to be the bad guys and the butts of jokes. Sleuth's main eunuchs are real and complex characters, and because of this, the show gets to explore what it is to live in this weird third-gender category of incredible power and powerlessness.

Now, don't go into this expecting woke gender treatises. Wang Zhi's never going to sit down and go, "You know, my friend and fellow eunuch Ding Rong, because of my lack of a penis, I understand my relationship to masculinity differently than other men do." But the show understands that even if he doesn't say it, it's true. And that makes a lot of the characters and their relationships just so much more interesting.

2. Uncle Jackie Money

Sleuth was the was the fourth c-drama I dove into, following the Untamed, Word of Honor, and Guardian -- or, Some Money BL, Less Money BL, and No Money BL. So imagine my absolute wall-eyed shock to find this was All The Money BL, courtesy of its executive producer, Jackie Chan (seen here with some of his handsome boys):

Sleuth looks good. The costumes are amazing. The sets are stunning. The cinematography is beautiful. Everything is so detailed, and while I can't speak to the absolute historical accuracy of all those details (see point 3), they're still gorgeous. In fact, you know what? I'm going to shut up and show you some of the promotional images.

(For actual screenshots, I'm just going to point you at @rongzhi's tsomd photoset tag, as they have done a tremendous service to the fan community -- though do beware of spoilers.)

Uncle Jackie's influence doesn't end with the money, though. Even though things get a bit goofy and wirework-y near the end, most of the drama's fights are shows of real martial arts skill. You can see his fingerprints on a lot of the choreography -- I'm thinking particularly of the time Tang Fan tries (and fails!) to stab Sui Zhou three times, which is pure Jackie Chan high-speed dexterity.

Add this one to the category of shows your Average American Television Enjoyer Who Can Handle Subtitles would like. In fact, I have shown the first episode to my normie father-in-law, who was impressed. Show it to your dad! See if he picks up on the gay!

3. I am from ... HISTORY!

The Chinese title translates to "The 14th Year of Chenghua," which works out to the year 1478. There are some clear anachronisms, but they tend to be played for comedy, so it's hard to hold that against them. On the whole, though, the show is trying real hard to evoke a very specific moment, and I feel it does so beautifully.

This does, however, mean that several of the characters are real people. I don't even have a good sense of how many of them are based on historical figures, that's how many. Hilariously, Wang Zhi's tag on AO3 used to read "Wang Zhi (?-1487 CE)."

Moreover, these are characters I've seen pop up in other media, played very differently! In particular, Noble Consort (up there in blue) tends to be written as an uncomplicated villain elsewhere, whereas Sleuth gives her a chance to add some goodness to her badness, until, damn, you can't but root for the bitch. (It also downplays the cradle-robbing, which, honestly, is for the best.)

You may have guessed from the eunuch section earlier, but it bears repeating: Wang Zhi is straight-up the best character in the show. He's smart as hell, and he has to be, because the second he's stupid, he's dead. I actually consider it helpful to know ahead of time that he's never going to do a heel turn -- I feel like on my first watchthrough, I was holding my breath for the first two-thirds of the show, waiting for his sudden but inevitable betrayal. It does not come. Wang Zhi is one of the heroes.

He's also, like, evil. He orders people flogged, tortured, and executed. The very first thing you see him doing is sinister as hell. And the show clearly doesn't think this is good, but it also doesn't judge him for it. He's a traumatized seventeen-year-old who has not had a normal moment of his entire life. He's working thanklessly for a boss who could kill him on a whim -- and he's doing it because he literally, physically was made for his job. He's mildly freaking out because he has no emotional grounding to help him understand that these weirdos want to be his friends.

Was the real Wang Zhi like this? That's beside the point. The point is, you get to see how someone in that position could wind up as the war-crimes-committing platonic ideal of a little meow meow.

4. oh my god the food

Warning: This show will make you hungry.

Again, beware of spoilers, but @peppersandcreamsicle and @qinzai have put together an entire cook-along Google Doc so you don't just have to drool -- you can do something about it! Or you can just read it and learn about Chinese cuisine, which is a little more my speed.

But it's not just about how good the food looks. Food is a vital emotional part of the series. People bond over it. They make and share it as a sign of love and care. It indicates status, ethnicity, interest, personality. The show's message about the healing power of cooking for the people you love will bring you to tears.

And yes, Sui Zhou is the main one doing the cooking, so get ready to drool over both the dishes and the handsome man preparing them.

Oh, and as though that weren't enough, Fu Meng Po can actually cook in real life. He's so dreamy. Absolute unreal handsome man with a devastatingly sexy voice. (I know my opinion might be different if I could hear his Taiwanese accent, but I can't so it's not!)

5. An Unsunk Ship

So like I said, my intros to c-drama couples had been WangXian, WenZhou, and WeiLan. That meant I'd basically come to terms with the idea that you can't have a main couple in a BL-but-not-really drama without splitting them up at least a little in the end, for no-homo plausible deniability reasons.

Tang Fan and Sui Zhou are still definitvely, unequivocally together when the story ends, as the iconic pentultimate scene of the series confirms with beauty and simplicity. I refuse to give any more details than that, but that ship's afloat.

(These shirtless pictures aren't from the end, but I wanted to include them, and I didn't have a better place to do it. ...Also, you know, ships and water? Yeah?)

And I think their winding up together reflects Sleuth's entire attitude. Tang Fan is made of sunshine, and the series loves him for it. There is tragedy aplenty in this show, but there's no misery. It is ultimately a hopeful show that believes in the power of second chances, if you're willing to take them. Time and again, the moral of the story is that you are only ever as good as the people who have your back -- but you have to be willing to let them have your back. Let people help you. Let people cook for you. Let people give you a reason to keep living. And then keep living.

Also, Sui Zhou gets two good kabedons off on that little twink, which means they're legally married now. I don't make the rules.

Bonus: Banger opening theme

This is one you will watch all 48 times.

Bonus #2: The Halo Video

This is the video that made me go, huh, these Sleuth boys seem like other boys I've enjoyed! Perhaps I shall enjoy them as well! And then I did. So if that might be convincing to you too, well, have at it. Even if it isn't, it's a fascinating three-minute study of shared those-boys-are-in-love visual language across these shows.

Fair warning that it contains shots from right up to the end, so if you'd rather go in completely blank, give this one a pass until later. (Excuse me while I now go watch it for the 10000th time.)

Have I convinced you to watch it yet?

It originally ran on iQiyi, though Viki's got it as well, and Viki's is free if you're willing to put up with some ads about it.

...I just noticed iQiyi's description of the series reads, "When the two handsome leading actors Darren Wang and Fu Meng-Po work together, what will happen? A lovely prefectural judge and an arrogant embroiered [sic] uniform guard join hands to crack unusual cases! Are you going to choose a new idol?" And you know what? Yes. The details are a little off, but that is the correct spirit. Thank you, thirsty blurb.

[notcsk]

i have to ramble about this bc i've seen no one bring it up (Boonboomger)

I think it's so fucking sick to see Mira and Jou's very different reactions to Taiya's lies and reckless behavior in the newest episode. Jou's just a big puppy, we know from the toilet episode that he sincerely wants to save people and protect the innocent, so he's really upset because he joined the Boonboomgers expecting to be a superhero. Mira's not heartless at all, quite the opposite, but I genuinely don't think that's what mattered to her at all in this case.

Because of episode 1.

"Let me guess. You don't like someone else taking the wheel for you."

I'm still on my OT3 + accelbrake bullshit, dw, but I knew from that moment that Taiya and Mira's relationship would be the most special to me. I'd bet anything that this quote is going to repeatedly come back and be relevant for the two of them in particular, because it clearly deeply resonated with Mira, who had previously just kinda gone with the flow, as shown with her ex-boyfriend and her various part-time jobs, but also with Taiya, because the scene makes it clear that quote is coming from somewhere significant to him as well (and hopefully episode 9 will shed more light on this through revealing some of Taiya's backstory, fingers crossed).

Not only is that romantic as hell to my sappy ass brain (especially since not even Chasshiro and Genba questioned Taiya's ruse or motives in episode 8, only Mira did. You even see Chasshiro falter and hesitate once Mira calls them out in the cage.), but also it makes Mira being the one to yell at Taiya so much more significant. Mira is canonically the biggest driving prodigy among the Boonboomgers. It's not about the team not being started for the sake of defending the earth, they're doing the right thing anyway. It's the fact that Mira finally found a purpose to dedicate herself to, one she's truly one-of-a-kind good at, but it was all for the sake of an unspoken agenda. Someone else took the wheel. If Taiya had told her the truth from the start, I know she would have taken to the Big Bang Grand-Prix like a fish to water, and doing hero work on the side would just have been a happy bonus! But he didn't. He made the decision for her without involving her in the process.

And look i just think that's a really fucking juicy dynamic unique to the two of them, and I can't wait to find out what made Taiya, the person who told Mira that quote in the first place, willing to go behind her back after that. We're going to be digging into this further, I'm so sure of it, with how Mira was singled out in episode 8, and I cannot wait for the angst but also how good their particular dynamic is going to be once she makes Taiya see that the team is willing to stand by his dream if he's willing to stand by them.

[lgbtlunaverse]

3zun data analysis part 2 electric boogaloo

So in my first post on 3zun data analysis I said I manually excluded all non-3zun ships in the 3zun tag to figure out how many of them were actually centered around 3zun.

So that's... actually not how i first went about that. Instead, I decided to, one after the other, include each 2-out-of-3zun ship, and then manually exclude every relationship not contained in 3zun. (leaving te other 2-out-of-3zun ships alone) Then, I'd figure out how many of these fics were exclusively tagged the ship I included, how many included only one of the other 2 ships, and how many included all 3, which would allow me to calculate how many 3zun fics in total had 2-out-of-3zun ships included but no other side pairings, which, upon being added to the otp:true fics, should give me the total number of 3zun fics exclusively focused on 3zun.

"Wow! That seems really inefficient" yes! But it did give me more information for this post. Because with these numbers, I can somewhat crudely estimate what 2-out-of-3zun pairing tends to get more narrative focus within 3zun fics.

Here are the results, data collected on march 18th 2024:

There are 196 3zun fics tagged with xiyao and no non-3zun relationships. Of these, 151 are also tagged nieyao, and 137 are tagged nielan.

Coincidentally, nieyao has the same number, also 196, 151 of wich are also tagged xiyao, but only 117 are tagged nielan.

Then there are 159 3zun fics tagged nielan with no non-3zun pairings, with 137 of them also being tagged xiyao and 117 nieyao. (I hope you've all noticed those numbers matching up!)

by the way, here are the raw stats in just the plain vanilla 3zun tag, no filters, for how many fics are tagged with the different ot2s.

Also, this has nothing to do with anything, but for nielan and xiyao i mostly had to filter out relatively normal side pairings, a few crossovers with mxtx's other works or different danmei, nothing too weird. But the nieyao tag had THIS

JESUS/JUDAS??? IN MY NIEYAO?? It's more likely than you think!!

Anyway, to the complicated numbers! Selecting for all 3 after excluding everything else gives you 112 fics.

With these numbers you can now calculate some really fun stuff. Taking the fics tagged with both xiyao and nieyao (151) and subtracting the fics tagging all 3 (112) you get the number of 3zun fics that are only tagged as xiyao and nieyao, excluding nielan. In this case: 39

"Couldn't you just exclude nielan on ao3" you have to understand I like doing things the hard way.

Doing this gives:

Fics tagged nieyao and xiyao but not nielan: 39

Fics tagged xiyao and nielan but not nieyao: 25

Fics tagged nieyao and nielan but not xiyao: 5

Generally tagging 2 ot2 pairings in an ot3 signals that either the relationship is a V and the excluded ship are not together, or that- even if they're a triad- the excluded ship doesn't feature in the narrative much. As you can see, xiyao is by far the least likely to be excluded here.

Now doing some more math (or, if you're normal, clicking a few extra times on ao3) will give you the fics exclusively tagged with one ot2 pairing besides 3zun. Generally that means that this relationship is the narrative focus, even if all of 3zun are together.

And these results actually surprised me.

Fics exclusively tagged xiyao: 196 - 112 - 39 - 25 = 20

Fics exclusively tagged nielan: 159 - 112- 25 - 5 = 17

Fics exclusively tagged nieyao: 196 - 112 - 39 - 5 = 40

I checked the answers by actually filtering on ao3 (making all my work redundant) and uh. Yeah. I had expected that, with xiyao being the least likely to be excluded, the most commonly tagged ship in 3zun overall, and simply the most popular ship, they'd be first here too.

And yet, not only does nieyao have more fics, it has more than nielan and xiyao combined. Despite having less fics in total than either of the other 2!

Out of interest, I repeated the experiment without manually excluding all the unrelated ships.

Basically, for each 2-out-of-3zun ship, I only filtered out the two other ships. This data will give us the same insight into narrative focus, just without excluding all other non 3zun rleated side pairings.

This time I just included one ship, and excluded the other 2-out-of-3zun ships. (the hard math comes later)

Doing this gives:

3zun fics only tagged xiyao: 45

3zun fics only tagged nielan: 33

3zun fics only tagged nieyao: 59

It's a less drastic difference, but nieyao still come out on top!!

What this means, I think, is that people with nieyao as their absolute favorite side of the triangle are a lot more likely to write 3zun fics than those for whom the same is true for nielan or xiyao.

That is to say: Someone who likes all 3zun pairings equally is more likely to write 3zun where the pairings all share narrative balance. And if you really really really love xiyao, and think nieyao and nielan are pretty ok but you don't go crazy over them, you're a lot more likely to just write a solo xiyao fic than you are a xiyao-focused 3zun fic. Idem ditto for nielan. But if nieyao is your absolute fave, you wanna put those guys in a throuple anyway.

What I'm saying is I think nieyaoists are the subfandom of triangular desire. Which... *looks at my own mutuals*... is the least surprising thing i've ever said.

Anyway! I didn't stop there! I wanted to see which pairings were more likely to get tagged together again. I also decided to make things even harder for myself!

Instead of filtering one ship at a time and seeing how many of each of the others were tagged alongside it, like i did last time, I only gave myself a few figures to calculate it manually: The overall number of tags each had in the 3zun tag (348, 328, and 284, as pictured above) the afformentioned data about exclusively tagged fics, and the number of fics tagged with all three 2-out-of-3zun ships (175)

Rather than a simple subtraction, I had to... Well i'm just gonna let y'all look at my notes app. I wanna stress that i could have looked all of this up in minutes and in fact did later to check my answers! No time was saved! A lot was wasted!

But I like number so 👉👈

Tldr:

Fics tagged xiyao and nieyao but not nielan: 73

Fics tagged xiyao and nielan but not nieyao: 55

Fics tagged nieyao and nielan but not xiyao: 21

Once again, similar but slightly less drastic results.

With this I can only come to one conclusion: the fandom likes to joke about 3zun being a love triangle with xichen in the middle. But looking at these numbers? The real center is jiggy. Everything revolves around a-yao, baby!.

[olderthannetfic]

Idk if this is a trope, or a genre-thing, or a real life thing, but I've been seeing more and more of my internet acquaintance circle say that a character being friends with an ex is a big turn-off to them in media they consume. It's really weird to me because I don't even know it's apparently such a big deal in media to be mentioned, but also, what's bad about staying friends with an ex to begin with? If we split amicably I'd rather stay in good contact, than completely cut someone off. Especially if that person was a good friend to begin with. I don't think I've seen that much media revolving around this at all tbh, and it's weird how they started mentioning it recently. Ok Christmas is the time of love and friendship, but stills feels kinda random. Is it like a side effect of current dating culture, or is that an old thing? I notice it more with internet acquaintances than my IRL friends as well. I don't think the idea of writing about two people staying friends after a break-up turns into a cheap porn plot of them just fucking behind any new girl/boyfriends. If that happens, then that is a cheap porn plot. I just wanna know what the fuck they're media they're looking at.

--

Well... to be honest, a lot of people aren't friends before they date someone and do treat romantic prospects and friends differently.

I think a lot of media also does this. Not only does your standard bad tv writing use the ex for drama in most cases, but the writing of the actual friendship part is often unconvincing.

I know a lot of people, usually guys, who met some girl on a dating app or asked her out in a bar because she was pretty who pull the "We should stay friends" thing, and it's laughable. They weren't friends, and the way that woman socializes outside of her boyfriend isn't compatible with how he socializes.

It's much less weird if it's somebody from your friend circle whom you knew for a long time first.

For me personally, in the context of fiction, the biggest problem is that a sufficiently interesting friendship will make me ship those characters and not the current ship that the media is pushing. Or, on rare occasions, I won't even ship them, but I just want to hear about their friendship and not the romance.

IRL, there are lots of reasons people just don't work out, but in fiction, I'm constantly going "Okay, but they could get back together though!" Unlike with real people, there's no reason some subtle shade of their personality couldn't be a little different or they couldn't change their mind about lifestyle things in a way that would make the couple great together this time around.

It would probably annoy me less in extremely realistic dramas about daily life, but I dislike those. Most things I actually consume just either make me think "Why are we wasting time on the current ship?" or "OT3! OT3!"

Part of making good fiction is paring away the less essential stuff to let the main points shine. A too-good friendship does steal airtime from a romance in a lot of cases.

--

OTOH, I do know a bunch of neurotic people who just hate it when any ex is within a thousand miles because they've got cheating on the brain.

[redriotinggg]

For the ship bingo: sanuso, zosopp, usonami and lusopp 👀. You can pick and choose if these are too many

Yaaaay thanks so much!! I’ll do them all <3

SanUso

Of COURSE I got a bingo with SanUso. They're my top OP ship, if that's not obvious. I have So Many thoughts about them; they spin around in my head 24/7. They're my favourite characters, and their canon dynamic is so fun and heart-warming, so it's no wonder why they've stolen my heart. I resonate VERY strongly with both Sanji and Usopp's characters so projecting onto them is my favourite thing in the world. I read and write fic for them constantly. I WANT TO KISS THEM BOTH I HAVE A HUGE CRUSH ON BOTH OF THEM. SANUSO CALL ME PLEASE. I need more canon scenes of them together before I lose my mind because it's been way too long. Love them as a monogamous couple, and as an OT3 with Zoro and the East Blue Polycule.

ZoSopp

OKAY SO I love these guys a lot!! They were my very first One Piece ship because of all their interactions pre-timeskip. Their canon relationship is what is most interesting to me. Since they met, Zoro always had unwavering faith in Usopp's strength and I think he's helped him become more confident. I love how Usopp always messes with Zoro and hides behind him. I think about what their dynamic post-Water 7 must be A Lot. I enjoy them romantically, but I think I like their platonic relationship the best. I love them in the ZoSanUso trio and the East Blue Polycule. ZoSopp fic is rare, but what's out there is so good. I hope to write more for them.

UsoNami

THE BESTIES EVERRRRR!!!!! I definitely prefer them as friends/in a queer-platonic relationship, but their friendship is so sweet that a romantic relationship isn't out of left field. I strongly believe that they have a FWB relationship (I'll finish my fic soon I PROMISE). I like them in the East Blue 5 polycule, where they are the Bosses of the group. I don't really read fic of them but maybe I should.

And they look so good together like?? Their matching fits are adorable, I adore them so much.

LuSopp

GOD, okay. Again, the bestie vibes are super strong with these two, which can easily lead to a romantic relationship, especially with how tactile they both are. Their canon dynamic makes me INSANE. The love they have for each other is so obvious and sweet. Despite their similarities, they're so different in how they think that it makes them clash HARD, as rarely as it happens. And again, big fan of EB5 polycule. I occasionally read fic for them.

If you wanna be messy like I do, y'all should send me ships that I don't talk about on my blog 👀👀👀

Come play Ship Game Bingo!

[watcherintheweyr]

i think your idea that viserys named naerys after rhaenyra it's so sweet, i'm crying it rare seeing such lovely post in this fandom especially about viserys since for some reason people say he hated his mother

do you have more ideas or headcanon like that? if you do i would love to know

People only think Voserys hated his mother bc they have poor critical thinking skills. He and Aegon mourned her their whole lives. She loved them and raised them to be phenomenal princes and kings. I don't particularly like Viserys II but I can't deny he's effective.

As for other similar headcanons... hmmm....

I think Rhaenyra and Daemon would've had more kids if they'd been able- and girls would've been names Visenya, Alyssa, and Aemma.

I think Rhaenyra specifically.picked Mornong's egg for Rhaena because the lovely pink and strong black made her think of her stepdaughter.

I think that while Baela and Rhaena obviously love and miss their mother and carry many of her traits, I think that while Baela is Daemon's mini-me, Rhaena is Rhaenyras. I've had that hc since the book- and in the show, Rhaena often matches her dresses to Rhaenyras, and from what we've seen of her in s2 she's started styling her hair similarly to how Rhaenyra did at her age, and appears to be wearing Rhaenyras gold necklace from her wedding (or a very similar one!)

Rhaena had six daughters with her second husband and I firmly believe that while Baela named her daughter Laena, Rhaena defied political niceties, and named one daughter Rhaenyra. And perhaps another daughter was named a feminine version of Lucerys- to honor her first betrothed, who she clearly had a good relationship with.

I think that Luke and Rhaena would have made a fantastic Lord and Lady of the Tides- and Baela and Jace would've been among the best rulers Westeros ever had.

I also will die on the hill that if she hadn't been so deeply sabotaged and destroyed by grief and betrayal, Rhaenyra would've been a solidly good queen.

I think that Cregan, Jace, and Baela would've been the OT3 to end all OT3s and I honestly think Cregan mightve considered staying south to be Jace's hand, if things had played out differently.

I definitely think Aegon3 wanted to name his sons for the brothers he lost, but was pressured out of it due to the political unrest. And honestly, sadly, I do think Viserys would've been the one to dissuade him, and that likely would've deeply damaged their relationship

I headcanon that every time Rhaenyra had a child, Syrax laid a clutch- their bond is shown to be so deep to the point that they share paim, and Rhaenyra shows a deep love and respect for Syrax. Honestly all of team Black show their dragons a lot of love and respect- unlike team Green who sort of just use their dragons as tools of war and naught else.

I think if things hadn't ended how they did, Aegon 3 would've claimed Grey Ghost. Their personalities suit one another so well! Rhaenyra would've been so proud, and Daemon would've helped him every step of the way. (Side note, @spreta-invidia wrote the Best aegon3 fic quite literally ever, and he and Grey Ghost... 👀 anyways you should read the fic)

Idk I have a lot of Targaryen headcanons, particularly for Rhaenyra and her family bc they're my favorites of House Targaryen. If you'd like any more feel free to shoot me another ask- but I tend to kinda error 404 when questions are vague so if there's anything specific you'd like to know my headcanons about that'd be super helpful lmao

[hils79]

Hils Watches Mysterious Lotus Casebook - Ep 8

I didn't watch one yesterday as I was visiting friends so it feels like forever since I watched this

Oh shit the evil child has figured out who Li Lianhua really is

Okay, I usually put two images above the Read More but this is a pretty major thing so

WHAT THE ACTUAL SHIT THE EVIL KID IS THIS DUDE IN DISGUISE???

Wait, does this mean Xiao Hua could theoretically disguise himself as a small child?

Well this has blown my 'he's going to give Li Lianhua the elixir so he has a worthy opponent' theory that I had a couple of episodes ago. Come on dude you can't kill him now he's all weak and pathetic. You were literally just complaining how sad you were about having no one worth fighting left in the world

That was a very dramatic entrance

The last time they met they fought to the death. Now that they're reunited Li Lianhua has decided to...flirt with him?

I think Fang Duobing would disagree

Why does this feel like Li Lianhua has just reunited with his ex-boyfriend who is still bitter about their breakup 10 years later

I still haven't decided whether I think he's dying in the way that Su Mengzhen was dying or if he's dying in a 'it'll be okay they'll find a cure' kind of way. Heroes kind of made it clear from the first episode how it was going to end. This one is less clear. I don't think I want to know so no spoilers please but I may change my mind on this later

Aww he went back to the tomb to get his puppy. His human puppy not his actual dog.

He's been unconscious for ages but the first thing he does when he wakes up is fret about Li Lianhua. He's a good boy.

Yeah, he pretends he doesn't care but we all know he does now

Poor Fang Duobing now thinks Li Xiangyi is a quack doctor named Li Lianhua and Di Feisheng is a servant named a-Fei

When the new boyfriend meets the old boyfriend. Look, we all know the solution to a love triangle is an OT3

Yes, that's more like it

Why do I feel like this is going to backfire spectacularly

Haha! He ate it all and it turns out he couldn't actually taste that it was bad

THERE'S ONLY ONE (GUEST) BED

Now kiss?

Asexual Li Lianhua?

I thought Di Feisheng was the one who poisoned him but apparently it was some other dude?

Dude stop trying to push your heterosexual agenda

Fang Duobing introducing Li Lianhua to himself

[lunar-years]

Okay because it was briefly mentioned in this post speculating on Roy's parents I really want to hear people's thoughts on Keeley's parents/childhood and why she had no prior family obligations on (Sexy) Christmas!

Similarly to Roy we only get very brief mentions of their existence in canon (and they're notably just about her mum, never her dad):

"I did used to worry I was gonna end up like my mum. She spent years tirelessly working at the same company just for a man to take all the credit. She wasn't brave enough to dream big. So I decided to do things very differently" - Keeley "We didn't open [the champagne] when your mum moved back up North" - Roy

The headcanons I've got are:

Keeley's parents are divorced and she isn't particularly close with either of them. Her mum irritates her literally every time they see one another. Her dad has a new wife and (step)kids he treats as his "real family," and Keeley is always the afterthought; she rarely sees him.

Her mum is extremely conventional and thinks Keeley needs to fit into that same box. She was appalled by Keeley's choice to do nude modeling, refused to talk to her because of it (which Keeley was thrilled by, and once her mum realized that she got even more upset and immediately started calling Keeley up again) and has never treated Keeley's modeling career as a real career.

Keeley moved out of her childhood home asap, like age 17/18 after taking her first modeling gigs. She rented a cheap flat with a bunch of other girls.

Keeley has made some of her choices in part just to spite her, whether its subconscious or not. For instance, if her mum was complaining about her first topless photoshoot, where her nipples were strategically covered by liquor bottles, Keeley made sure the next shoot she signed on for was tits out, no coverage. When her mum complained about that she did full nudes, etc.

When Keeley started working for AFC Richmond it was a backhanded "finally you have a REAL job, thank goodness" instead of "congratulations, I'm so proud of you." everything with her mother is like this

It is even worse with relationships. Her mum thinks Keeley needs to settle down, get married and have kids in that order - none of which are things Keeley has ever intended to do with her life.

her mum was thrilled when Keeley introduced her to Roy because "finally my daughter is in a serious relationship and they will give me grandkids soon" she completely dotes over Roy because of this while asking increasingly intrusive, prodding questions about the status of their relationship. Roy of course sees right through this but is trying his best to stay polite because this is Keeley's mother. The whole thing slowly infuriates Keeley until she's had enough and abruptly informs them they're leaving. this is how roykeeley have the "I never want kids" conversation very early on in their relationship

with holidays like Christmas, at first Keeley would use the other parent as the ~reason~ she couldn't be at theirs for the holiday. Like, she'd tell her mum "sorry, i told dad I'd go to his" and she'd tell her dad the opposite. of course this only works a few times before it's "why do you spend every holiday with the other parent instead of me," and which point Keeley remembered that wait, actually she doesn't give a fuck! and straight up told her mother she isn't coming because she doesn't want to and already has plans with her boyfriend/girlfriend (whoever it was at the time) 🤷‍♀️ slay queen

Keeley is out and proud and always has been, but her mum treats her being bi as another lie she's telling for attention, even though Keeley has literally brought girlfriends home to introduce to her mother before. No matter what she does, her mum maintains that Keeley is only doing it to piss her off and basically doesn't believe her or acknowledge her sexuality, which is understandably very upsetting to Keeley

Bonus ot3: Not to make everything about ot3 but I have a very distinct scene in my head where Keeley introduces Jamie and Roy as her boyfriends and her mum is forcibly polite to Jamie (whom she is meeting for the first time) but then pulls Keeley aside to be like "enough with your stunts, Keeley, how could you put Roy through this nonsense, after he took you back and all, this is how you repay him, by dating someone else?" (because 1. she's adamantly ignoring the part where Keeley told her all three of them were dating, royxjamie included and 2. she acts like Keeley obviously did something to "cause" Roy breaking up with her). Keeley for once is totally speechless and all the retorts she wants to and would usually say die in her throat and she just wants to cry because she's tired of this. Roy and Jamie overhear the conversation and Roy steps in like "okay, that's enough, we're leaving." Keeley has a breakdown in the car before they've even gotten out of the driveway and after that she basically cuts off contact for a long while with her mother, with Roy & Jamie's full support.

[ellsieee]

I'm really going to miss SWM despite the sad ending. The actors really did a great job with what they had and could do. I knew the accident was going to hurt me, and that it would be a OE, but I did not expect it to be more like a BE. More about that later. At least we got a whole episode of happy boys before all the shit hit the fan.

This scene really touched me. Su Yu pushes Wu Bi to achieve his dreams and is there to support him all the way. We also get another hint of what Wu Bi's time capsule wish is. My guess is that he wished for he, Su Yu and Doudou to always be together. Normally it's Wu Bi who is always saying he doesn't want to be separated from Su Yu, but this time, it's Su Yu telling Wu Bi not to leave him, pulling on Wu Bi's heartstrings. 🥹

Why does Wu Bi have a picture of his and Su Yu's epic bike ride framed? Did his mother draw that? Did he get the idea from her? Wu Bi, I have so many questions...

Su Yu wrote a wish card for Wu Bi too. 🥹 I am not ok. 😭

One last shout out to the shipper girl. She knows. 🤭 I'm glad they didn't write her as a crazy person, inserting herself into Wu Bi and Su Yu's relationship and doing a bunch of weird stuff to get them together.

Arghhhh the foreshadowing! When Su Yu said that, my heart filled with dread even though I already knew what was coming. No. They're going to ride their bike together forever ok. 😭

Wu Bi is so completely smitten with Su Yu. It's all heart eyes, all the time. They are so cute. Was this the reward Su Yu was talking about? I thought it would be something 🔞, but taking Wu Bi on a date might motivate him even more. I mean what kind of equestrian center has prince charming equestrian outfits? 🤭 I think they look great, but this totally looks like a date (Doudou is just there to make it look less gay).

Wait a minute... that's not what the director demonstrated! I wanted to see that peck on the lips! Please tell me they shot two versions and we'll see the uncut version later. 🙏

Psycho alert! 🚨 Mo Yi was hella creepy here. I was a bit scared he would actually hurt Su Yu. You can feel all the resentment he has for Su Yu. First his ex-gf wanted to be with Su Yu rather than him. Second, Wu Bi has chosen Su Yu over him and is acting like a little bitch towards him. Not defending him, but I honestly don't think Mo Yi would have felt such hatred and resentment if Wu Bi hadn't started being really rude and bratty towards him after falling in love with Su Yu.

The ultimate sacrifice. 😭 Wu Bi knew there was no way to stop the car safely so he chose to protect Su Yu by crashing the car on the driver's side. Even though I knew the accident was going to happen, it still hurt so much. Wu Bi will always protect Su Yu no matter what. I read some comments scolding Su Yu for sleeping even though he knew something was wrong with the car. My interpretation is that Su Yu wasn't sleeping, he was worried too, but he trusted Wu Bi completely, and Wu Bi told him to rest because he can handle it, so he did. The level of trust and confidence you need to have in your partner for that is just...

I didn't notice this the first time watching because I was too busy wailing, but Wu Bi hugged Su Yu to protect him. FUCK. 😭😭😭😭 For all the unreasonable jealousy and temper tantrums, Wu Bi really is the best boy.

This is so painful, I can't screencap bloody Wu Bi anymore. It killed me that Wu Bi woke up for a second to stare into Su Yu's eyes when Doudou called to complete their OT3, only to fall into a comma again.

Argh this ending! Is Wu Bi alive or dead? I didn't notice that the doctor nods a little when speaking to Su Yu the first time around. Doctors usually only nod when the operation was successful, so I guess Wu Bi is alive but what about the empty house? Only Wu Bi's stuff is still there, meaning that everyone left him? How is this not a BE? 😭

Of course this makes sense as a set up for a season 2 but I feel like they still could have given us a conclusion. Something like Wu Bi lives, but Su Yu left because he knew Mo Yi was crazy and he wanted to protect Wu Bi. Then the new season would be about how the boys find their way back to each other. It wasn't necessary to leave viewers hanging and heartbroken. 😢 And with 24 episodes of 30+ minutes runtime, I felt the team had enough time to tell a complete story. It shouldn't matter that book 1 of the novel ended like the series because the drama should stand on its own outside of the novel. Besides, wouldn't it have been safer just to film the whole thing at once to avoid the risk of not being allowed to film part 2?

There's a lot of doubt that S2 will actually happen, but someone asked Mo Yi's actor if there will be a 2nd season and he said that there should be. I'm not going to get my hopes up too much before there is official news that everyone is shooting again to spare myself any disappointment, but of course I am hoping for a second season. In the meantime, I hope cjd will release the uncut version of the series that she teased about before. I really do love this series so much even though I was disappointed with the ending. I'll have to treat SWM like MODC and skip the end. SWM only has 22 episodes. Yup. 🤡

[welcometothejianghu]

Welcome to another round of W2 Tells You What You Should See, where W2 (me) tries to sell you (you) on something you should be watching. Today's choice: 民国奇探/My Roommate is a Detective.

My Roommate is a Detective is a 2020 drama about the Jazz Age shenanigans of a terrible OT3: a useless noodle boy, a spoiled journalist girl, and a handsome thug-turned-cop, who together solve Agatha Christie mysteries in 1920s Shanghai.

I mean, seriously, have you ever wondered what Hercule Poirot would be like if he were a 6'2" Chinese rubber man? If he had a long-suffering sugar daddy from the wrong side of the tracks and a spunky sugar mommy who owned their shared apartment? The answer is, it would be a laugh-out-loud-funny series about a ridiculous and charming assortment of weirdos solving only slightly believable murder mysteries in charming period clothing.

This is another one of those shows where I'm kind of shocked at how not well-known it is, except I'm not, because I can see exactly the problems that keep fandom from descending on it like horny little vultures. Nonetheless, I think it's a good time that more people would enjoy if they gave it the chance. Here's five reasons why you should:

1. Equal parts smart as heck and dumb as butts

On the one hand, especially given its tone and tenor, this show has many surprisingly clever turns and thoughtful moments, carried along by some talented actors. On the other hand, [.gif of a guinea pig in a rollerskate being pushed merrily down a hallway]

This show is not a complicated intellectual exercise. It's an action comedy about a goofy sleuth, a rich-girl reporter, and the cop who should be the straight man in this trio, except he's as much of a goober as the other two are. If the promotional tableaus are giving you real "cover of a Clue box" vibes, you've understood the kind of pastiche it's pulling off.

The mysteries are preposterous. They're all the kind of thing that exemplify the Doyle line about how, when you've eliminated the impossible, whatever's left has got to be the answer, no matter how ding-dang improbable it may be. You know the type: tons of overly elaborate setups, unbelievably perfect timing, coincidental long-lost relatives, people hallucinating right and left. They're also very short -- most full cases take only 2-3 episodes to introduce, investigate, and resolve, even when interspersed with the larger goings-on in these weirdos' lives. The DramaWiki page for the show lists 23 separate arcs over 36 episodes, so you do the math.

And yet, it's way more thoughtful and clever than its doofy little setup would indicate. Its attention to detail surprised me on more than one occasion. Add to that a bunch of solid performances from an ensemble of real characters, and what you get is definitely more substantive than a junk-food waste of time. You can't turn your brain off while watching it, but you sure can turn it down, and that's great.

It also doesn't hurt that everyone is super attractive and wearing great outfits. The whole show's worth it for the wardrobes.

2. THE GIRL

Fuck the haters, fuck everyone, I am going to climb right up on my little soapbox and tell you all why Bai Youning is awesome.

She is insane. She's a troll. She's a clever little monster. Every other character's response to her is, oh my god, you are literally the worst. And she is! She has been spoiled beyond belief by her incredibly rich Crime Dad, and she has learned to leverage her uwu just a widdle girl status to get her whatever the hell she wants. She simply cannot hear it when someone says the word "no." She will look her future sister-in-law in the eye and point a loaded gun at her own head without blinking. Every ball she has is made of brass.

She's hardly perfect. During the course of the show, there are some times where her entitlement runs face-first into the brick wall of reality. She's not nearly as good at her chosen career path as she's been told (mostly by the people who get paid to tell her she's good). She's rarely prepared to deal with the consequences of her actions, especially when she can't just throw money at the problem.

So she learns, and grows, and changes. She's always going to be a stubborn bitch, but she can become a stubborn bitch with a more accurate conception of her relationship to the world around her.

She's actually a really good romantic foil for Lu Yao, who is equally stubborn and spoiled and obnoxious as hell. It is a pure brat4brat relationship, where each one thrives on comically enraging the other. What this means, though, is that when they actually start showing one another some vulnerability, it's really sweet.

Now: I'm pretty sure that you could not have made a female character in her position that everyone did not hate, no matter how cool you made her, because that is the fate of all girls who theoretically keep the two boys from kissing. (More on that next point.) If she were less outgoing and friendly, she would've been hated for being too cold. If she were less headstrong, she would've been hated for being a pushover. If she weren't as into the boy, she would've been hated for being frigid. I know the "god forbid a woman do anything" meme is a joke, but ... man, god forbid this girl do anything. She gets a level of hate entirely disproportionate to what she's actually like. As I said with Eom Dada, it's not always sexism, but sometimes, yeah, it's sexism.

(Real talk: Her character is also fighting both how she's definitely not written as well as the boys are and how the plot sometimes needs her to be artificially stupid and jealous for Straightness Drama Reasons, so that's a legit problem on a structural level. Also, she's dubbed by someone else and the boys aren't, which gives her voice an annoying not-quite-there quality that's hard to ignore. The deck is stacked against her real hard even before she steps onscreen.)

So here's my advice: Go into this show wanting to like her. Embrace her terribleness as a positive, intentional quality. Don't be mad at her for straightening up an endgame that was never going to be gay, even without her. Welcome her contributions to the chaos. Realize that she is exactly as entertainingly irritating as her boys are.

Truly, this is a story of three terrible people in love. They're all just awful, and you wouldn't want to be in a room with any of them for longer than you had to. Left to right up there, Bai Youning is spoiled and self-absorbed, Lu Yao is arrogant and lazy, and Qiao Chusheng is suuuuuch a fucking cop. If you're into the kind of dynamic that can only be described OT3: You All Deserve One Another, then this one's perfect for you.

3. Do you really miss '00s queerbaiting?

Like, really? Are you just super-nostalgic for being able to see the showrunners go, ha ha, girls, we know you're watching and we know you want these cute boys to kiss, which they never will -- but what if we pretended for just this one scene??? Do you just carnally ache for that with every fiber of your being?

Yep.

Now, why am I calling the occasional really gay moments between these two gentlemen "queerbaiting" and not "bromance"? Because these moments are a) obviously intentional, b) completely sporadic, and c) never spoken of again.

For example: There's a scene (which you can see a gifset of here) where the two of them are at a restaurant frequented by the cop, who brings a lot of ladies there on dates. When the waiter points this out, useless noodle boy says, I'm his date. The waiter looks mildly surprised by this, the cop says not to listen to his bullshit, and that's the end of it. The scene moves on. There is no further discussion of this comment. It does not affect their relationship.

That's the essence of queerbaiting: that little on-purpose nod to the homoerotic tension between the two, in a way that isn't a joke but also isn't not a joke, and either way is never going to happen. (In fact, the show is going to go out of its way to make sure that ship gets sunk, so, uh, get your fanfiction lifeboats ready for that.)

A true queerbaiting move is something that should make a difference in a relationship, but doesn't. It should make a difference that our cop is so comfortable in the noodle boy's personal space that he invades it at will. It doesn't. It should make a difference that noodle boy keeps getting real weird every time the cop has a date with a girl. It doesn't. Those are some real romantic moves the two of them keep pulling, and then nothing comes of them.

I had this show sold to me as being incredibly shippy, to the point of being even more so than its censored-BL contemporaries. And ... well, it is and it isn't. It has textually gayer individual moments, but it is much less pervasively gay. It's clear from the start that it's going to throw all its actual relationship points into its canon het romance. When it comes to these boys, the show is toying with you. It knows you want to see those boys smooch, just as much as it knows (and it knows you know) they're never gonna.

How you feel about this is entirely up to you -- and indeed, it may be a dealbreaker on the whole drama for you. If you are inclined to pitch a fit when your ship does not become canon, you'll be happier somewhere else. If, however, you see this as a delightful opportunity to do whatever the hell you want with the situation as it is presented, all the while enjoying little moments of startlingly blatant homoeroticism between two handsome dudes, well, here you are!

(I mean, if you want my take on it, what needs to happen is that the cop and the girl need to fuck while the useless noodle boy watches with asexual bisexual interest, and then they all need to snuggle with the noodle boy in the middle so they can both annoy him appropriately, but your mileage may vary.)

4. The multicultural extravaganza!

1920s Shanghai had a lot going on in terms of cultures and languages, and this show actually does a fair job of representing that.

By now, I've seen a number of shows set during this era, and they all at least acknowledge the international nature of the city -- usually by mentioning the French Concession and having a handful of evil Japanese characters. However, this is the first time I've seen a show go to such lengths to actually show so many non-Chinese characters onscreen, even to the point of making one a recurring character supporting the main squad.

Salim is the best. Whatever he is being paid, it's not enough. He's Qiao Chusheng's right-hand man, which means he is also the dude who most often has to put up the main trio's bullshit. (The actor himself is also a dude with a pretty cool backstory, which is another great layer.) He's sharp, he's loyal, he's patient, and he looks great with his shirt off. He's got it all!

Other non-Chinese characters include a white Jewish art collector (I'd issue a warning for period-typical antisemitism, except … honestly, it's mostly just confused), a sadistic priest who maybe is supposed to be Italian, a completely different priest who [last episode spoiler], and three whole sinister white dudes behind it all.

It's not just the world coming to China, though! A large number of the Chinese characters are said to have spent significant time outside of China, whether for business or for schooling. Near the end, when some characters are discussing moving away from Shanghai, they consider a number of foreign cities as potential destinations.

Here's a delightful detail: When Lu Yao and his sister speak English, they're dubbed by actors with posh British accents who sound like native (or near-native) English-speakers. This makes perfect sense, because both of the siblings did a lot of their schooling in the UK. When Bai Youning speaks English, she's dubbed by someone who speaks English very well but also has a noticeable Chinese accent, which makes perfect sense for her character's background. And Qiao Chusheng never speaks English at all, because he's a street tough who has no reason to know more than three words.

...This is also kind of weird to say about something literally made in China, but go with me on it: Everything's kind of got that Art Deco Orientalist vibe to it. It looks like China's idea of what Britain's idea of China during that period would have looked like. The result comes across less like what 1920s Shanghai would actually have looked like, and more what an ad for 1920s Shanghai would have looked like. It's a fascinating aesthetic, and more so for how it's mostly pretty subtle. The show isn't some visual extravaganza, but it's always very nice to look at, and I appreciate that in a show.

5. A wonderful horrible protagonist

A lot of mystery-themed prestige television involves an asshole genius detective who gets away with being a dick to everyone because he's sooooo smart, while all his long-suffering friends and colleagues spend a lot of time doing damage control for him because, sigh, he's an asshole but we need him, genius excuses all dickhead behavior, we'll always make exceptions for him because he's just ever so special. (Watch histrionic sage hbomberguy's video on Sherlock if you're unfamiliar with the trope.)

Lu Yao is an asshole genius detective, but one who winds up spending most of his time being an asshole to a) people who deserve it, or b) his horrible friends who will be assholes right back at him. When he is awful to the people who don't deserve it, the show smacks him pretty hard on the nose for it and makes him apologize.

This is a show where you'll figure out pretty quckly if you'll love it or hate it, because if you love Lu Yao, you'll love it, and vice versa. He carries most of the show himself, with his goofy charm and his incredibly bendy slenderman body and his ability to make the one competent person he knows both protect him and give him money.

Like so.

For my own part, I find him intensely charming, and I think a lot of this has to do with Hu Yitian's ability to play him as an affectionately bullyable weenie who needs to get shoved in a locker for his own good. He's the worst, and it's comically endearing instead of offputting because at the end of the day, he really does have a good heart. He's just also lazy as heck and disinclined to do anything that he does not want to be doing, and really, aren't we all?

As I alluded to in point 3, he comes across as real asexual. He's just not that interested in sex, and he is in fact pretty uncomfortable in situations where he finds himself the subject of someone else's sexual desires. He's perfectly capable of romantic feelings! I mean, not only does he get Bai Youning as a love interest, we actually meet one of his ex-girlfriends. He's just not partciularly horny about them -- which is even more noticeable as a sharp contrast to how extremely horny Qiao Chusheng is for just about everyone, but this exasperating little dork in particular.

(Like seriously, 90% of the time, Chusheng is about to explode with sexual frustration at Lu Yao's skinny oblivious ass.)

This isn't to say you couldn't get Lu Yao into bed, because you absolutely could, and he'd probably have a good time. You'd just have to remove all distractions from the room, lest his ADHD ass wind up running off to solve a crime mid-coitus.

Twiggy little nightmare man. Garbage-animal boy. Love him.

sidebar: A word about the ending

I'm going to be vague and talk about general vibes instead of specific events, but you should still skip this section if you want to remain completely unspoiled. Jump to the picture of Chusheng holding the sledgehammer.

Okay, so, a lot of people do not like the ending, and I'm including myself in that number. I honestly don't know if they got rushed and had to wrap everything pretty last-minute, or if they thought they might get a second season out of it and were leaving things open-ended accordingly. Either way, it's incredibly unsatisfying.

I think there's a clue that the show didn't actually want to end this way, and it's not actually in the text of the show itself. Every episode, between the last scene and the start of the credits, you get to see a couple still frames from the episode (usually some of the queerbaity ones). After the very final shot of the series, you get two images: the boys hugging goodbye, and Chusheng's upset face. That's not a resolution! That is at best a "to be continued..." ending!

But no, that's it. That's all, folks.

It's not quite an ending so bad it ruins the rest of the show, mostly because it doesn't feel finished, so it's less like you're watching a car being deliberately driven into a wall because someone thought that was the best route to take, and more like you're watching someone leave a car on the railroad tracks because they figured they'd have time to move it later.

As far as I know, there has been no noise made about a second season. These 36 episodes are the entirety of the narrative. It had the distinct misfortune to start airing in March 2020, which wasn't exactly prime time for planning sequels, and that seems to have been that. (There is a 2022 show called Checkmate that stars the two main guys in extremely similar roles, also adapting Agatha Christie stories, but it's apparently pretty meh? Somebody else who's actually seen it, go ahead and weigh in here.)

I'll say that if you turn off the episode right after Lu Yao gets out the handcuffs, you'll save yourself the worst of it the awkward and unsatisfying moments (though I'm impressed at your willpower to stop watching something five minutes from the end). That's not all of it, though. Structurally, there are several situations rushed to a resolution and loose threads left flapping untied in the breeze. I guess stopping before the last five minutes simply saves you the hope that it'll pull a good ending out of the fire, because it won't.

And let's be real: The more you hate Bai Youning and her romance with Lu Yao, the more you'll hate the ending. (Not that liking those elements will necessarily make you like the ending, of course, because I'm a fan of hers and I still think the ending is butts.) The ending is already like a pair of uncomfortable shoes; if the het romance especially makes you grind your teeth, the ending becomes a pair of uncomfortable shoes that also have a rock in them. A lot of the comments online indicate plenty of people dropped the show when they learned the het romance would be endgame. It's a pretty common dealbreaker.

Oh well. Bring on the fanfic, I say! Those of us who are used to taking a sledgehammer to canon are unafraid.

Smash it, baby.

Still want to see some of these mysteries?

Both iQiyi and Viki have the answer to your sleuthing!

It's not a perfect show -- as evidenced by my digression about the ending -- but it's a lot of fun. If you can handle the occasional foible and some eyebrow-raising moments, you're in for a good time with some attractive people that occasionally tastes very gay.

Every roommate crazy 'bout a sharp-dressed man

[thetwelfthcrow]

Soooo can we get recs for 443316?👀

but of COURSE you can !!

▴🏎 4433 fic recs: with Charles edition 🏎▴

welcome everyone to this special fic rec list: 443316 - fics where, in whatever order, lewis/max/charles are together. it's a short list, but i hope that serves only as an invite to write these three more. as far as i know these are the only fics in this ot3 ship and they're amaziiiing! i sincerely invite all lestappen, 4433 and 4416 shippers to give these a try. even if you don't like one of these three ships, these two fics are absolutely worth your time - i promise !

AO3 collection with all my Formula One bookmarks general favorite fics in the 4433 ship favorite christmas fics in the 4433 ship favorite omegaverse fics in the 4433 ship

always be sure to check the accurate and updated tags on the fic itself (i only copy a few)! if your fic is on here and you'd like me to link your tumblr then just comment below and i'll add it :)

▴ honey, there is no right way [series] by latebrakers | 11,3k | incomplete secret relationship 4433, charles helps them / pining / getting together

(1) fair weather | G | 3k | complete

The first time, Max asks Charles for a favor. The next time Max could use some help, Charles offers it himself.

(2) fair warning | T | 5k | complete

Charles thought he was being generous, at first, but now he just feels greedy.

(3) fair share | M | 3k | complete

Lewis takes his phone out of his pocket and props it on the porch railing. “Two minutes,” he announces. “Everyone think of a wish.” Charles could not possibly think of just one. Or: Charles books a flight to Colorado.

▴ three [series] by additivity | 20,3k | incomplete secret relationship / relationship reveal friends with benefits

straight-ish | M | 3,6k | complete

There were a lot of photos of Formula 1 drivers on the internet. But none like this.

amateur photography | E | 16,6k | 5/5ch, complete

Lewis really isn't looking for a relationship. Which is why his current arrangement is pretty perfect. What's not so great is trying to explain that to his press officer while F1 twitter self-destructs about it.

▴ behind different doors [series] by kiwialicat | 49,3k | incomplete established fwb lestappen / voyeurism / unresolved feelings

It’s not the size of your motorhome it’s how you use it | E | 6k | complete

Max looks back at him, and then down at the hand that Lewis still has firmly planted on Charles’s knee. Despite Lewis being a little less sharp than usual, it’s definitely not lost on him. “Jealous, Maxy?” Lewis doesn't want to waste this champagne, post Silverstone 2020 round one. He goes to find someone to celebrate with and gets a little more celebration than he'd hoped for.

Let’s feel this and think later | E | 31k | 6/6ch, complete

Lewis is pretty sure when it comes to Max and Charles there are strings, of one form or another, but he can’t deny there’s also a pretty incredible pay-off attached to those strings. It's the second week of the British GP double header, and it's a bit more memorable than usual for Lewis with a new version of Max and Charles in his life.

Room for three | E | 11k | complete

“So…” Lewis breathes deeply, “this offer…” he watches his hands open and close in front of him, “is this just a one-time thing? Tonight only?” Lewis has Max and Charles over for dinner. Some eating, some talking and some other stuff ensues.

▴ He Hit Me (It Felt Like A Kiss) by m00nlightE | 18,8k | 2/5ch, incomplete omegaverse / alpha max, alpha lewis, omega charles / emotional manipulation

It was something they’d often discussed at the beginning of the relationship: the potential that one day, sometime in the future, the three of them could end up fighting for a championship title against one another. So when the start of the 2021 season came around and it looked like Red Bull might be bringing the competition to Mercedes at last, Charles couldn’t help but feel the battle between his partners was inevitable. He just never expected to get so caught in the middle of it all. OR: Charles, Max and Lewis, and how their relationship turned toxic over the course of the 2021 season.

------------------

askbox always open for your favourite 4433(16) fics! i love to know what you love to read. this list is not complete (nor will it ever be), but it turned out all 443316 fics are amazing so these are the only fics in the tag rn. this IS AN INVITE to everyone reading all the way to here to write 443316 heheh! enjoy reading!

[greaseonmymouth]

leverage s5 revised episode order

so it's my understanding that it's pretty much general consensus that s5 is setting up the ot3 endgame, showing us throughout the season how close they are and how well they work together and establishing their relationship the best way they can without the network realising, right? we see this in how they do historical episodes, always pairing Nate and Sophie but they've paired Parker and Hardison and Parker and Eliot, and in the present they've done Eliot and Hardison enough times. and so the finale, The Long Goodbye Job, is the final dot over the i to make that clear - Eliot, Parker, and Hardison die together in the fake scenario because anything else would be anathema, and they skip off into the sunset together as a three person Leverage team while Nate and Sophie skip off together as Out Of The Game, For Good

The Frame Up Job and The Rundown Job support this by showing us how well Eliot, Parker, and Hardison work together, how flawless a team (how thoroughly established an ot3) and by showing us Nate and Sophie as a thoroughly established married couple disgustingly in love and bickering and on the same wavelength

now I propose (and not just because of Eliot's haircut in The Rundown Job clearly indicating this episode should've come later in the season) that The Long Goodbye Job was not intended to be the series finale, and that The Frame Up Job and The Rundown Job were supposed to form a two-episode series finale directly following The Long Goodbye Job. soft epilogues, if you will

points to consider:

in both of those episodes, the other half of the team does not appear and is not even mentioned. it's not like the Girls / Boys Night Out episodes, where the episodes are mirrored and the team is working on related problems, and is then reunited at the end - these are entirely separate episodes featuring two independent teams

Vance to Eliot: "Hell, your girlfriend's already out of her cuffs." Nobody corrects him. Not Parker, not Hardison, and not Eliot. Ok this one doesn't prove episode order I just love this subtle ot3 confirmation moment

Sterling, to Nate and Sophie: "Now I know where you are. Call me. I'm hiring."

this was already funny as is, and we're presuming this is because Sterling hasn't found out where the team relocated to after Boston, but imagine if this is actually after The Long Goodbye Job? Sterling let them go. Nate pushed him and he came down on the side of thieves, and he let them go, and then couldn't find them but now he has and his frustration with the case and Nate and Sophie's casual disregard and the final 'I'm hiring'? It's been a couple of months since The Long Goodbye Job and this is the most fun Sterling has had in ages

but the ot3 half ok. so The Long Goodbye Job tells us that they die together and they live together, and they continue Leverage as a 3 person team. Give it a couple of months and they're in DC and they face a real life and death moment - and they live together.

and also, you get Eliot telling Vance "I work with them now" and then he limps bloodily off into the sunset squished between Hardison and Parker like the three of them are off to have some incredible sex

listen I just think season 5 makes so much more sense if we consider those two episodes as the episodes establishing the happily ever after epilogues after The Long Goodbye Job

also in Leverage: Redemption the very first episode we find out that Nate had a shady stash of paintings and materials and whatnot so what if that is actually a hint that Nate and Sophie did actually get back into the game, with Sterling, until Nate passed away and Sophie clocked out?

[wingsofhcpe]

Oh tell me about the fifth season I’m intrigued 👀👀

RIGHT OKAY SO real quick rundown from what I remember, after I'm done studying I'll shoot you a DM if you wanna hear more!

The Fifth Season is the first book in the Broken Earth trilogy by NK Jemisin. The main premise is that people live in a continent that's very geologically active (volcanoes, earthquakes, etc etc) and because of that they're just... used to it. Any day they expect a catastrophic geological event that will lead to a post-apocalyptic series of years that will realistically claim thousands of lives every time. These events are called Seasons, and there's already been a bunch of them (records of each at the back of the book!). So people just kinda live with that knowledge and organise their society around it.

Now, the big deal is that some people are born with Earth magic, the ability to control, predict and prevent such disasters. They're called Orogenes, and you'd think they'd be revered... but they're not. They're seen as monsters, exactly because they can also cause those disasters. There's a special school of them and all but it's mostly like a holding pen for them, they're also assigned special human handlers who are equipped to kill them should they go rogue. So it's also very much a social commentary.

The real geological horror element, though, comes from two things: first, the Obelisks, mysterious massice stone structures that just... low-key float around in the sky and are generally horribly ominous, often associated with Seasons. Second, the stone people (who iirc have a name, I just can't recall it rn). Human-like beings that are ...basically stone/gem, though, not organic. They feed exclusively on rock and are actually fuckihg terrifying exactly because not much is known about them. I can't really describe either of these more without massive spoilers though, so I'll avoid it in case you wanna read it.

There's also an ot3 queer storyline somewhere in there but it's not the focus. Pretty cool though!

As for triggers, please be warned for violence, genocide, bigotry, extreme death mostly through natural disasters, possible genocide, and child abuse. Off the top of my head.

....this was supposed to be a quick rundown but I ended up writing down pretty much all I can remember about the books huh! Anyway, I still haven't read the 3rd book but the first two were GREAT and I can't wait to get the final one and see where this story goes. I think I'd put the first book especially among my Top 10 Fave Reads in general. Hope I sold it to you too! :D

[leletha-jann]

I've had almost a week to sit with today's page (Patreon!), and I think I'm somehow less coherent about it than I was a week ago.

Spoilers for the Girl Genius page for February 28, 2024, under the cut...

...the spoiler is the whole page.

Oh my great and various gods, look at them. Look how cute they are. Look how happy. They are their whole world, just the three of them, and just for a moment their whole world is right.

They're together again. And it's that simple.

Nobody's keeping score, nobody's handling anything "like gentlemen, of course", nobody's hesitating or uncomfortable or anything but perfectly happy right here.

"You're here!" Agatha says, and it sounds so much like "You're home!", and home is where the three of them are, together.

Look at the joy on this page.

My heart. My whole heart.

And yes, exciting and stressful things are going to happen after this. There is a Third Journey out there, with so many ways to break our hearts, so much drama to play out, so many cliffhangers to dangle us over. But we will always have this page, this one perfect moment.

Guys. Guys. Guys.

There are conversations to be had in-world, and our cuties should have them, but...

I think we're getting our OT3.

Side note, this page is now one of only two Girl Genius story pages, ever, to be saved whole and entire to my screensaver file, to pop up and delight me at random in days and years to come. (The first was "Agatha is Dreaming...", which is also my phone background.)